Sociological Analysis of Consuming Health (The Study of Clinic Costumers)

In contemporary consumer society, people pay attention to their health and happiness, because any social and cultural activity and any form of self-construction is bodily oriented. Body management, in its complicated form, is completely pervasive among most of the social classes and groups. This research is about to study the contexts and reasons of people’s interests in consuming medical commodities and drugs among Sanandaj inhabitants. So the theory of consumer society is the theoretical framework of this research. The method of study is grounded theory and the data were gathered by way of individual deep interview, as a qualitative technique. Theoretical-purposeful sampling was selected to select the interviewed. The findings show that social-normative expectations and financial-cultural challenges are facilitating contexts, while commodification of health and beauty and consumerism are casual conditions of this phenomena. Gaining social approval, social opportunities and identification are the main reasons, moreover, commodification of body, individualization of identity and mental disorders are the most important consequences of this phenomena.